Muḥammad al-Asadī—client of the Banū Kāhilah, a Kūfan, and a ḥāfiẓ.
His family came from the outskirts of Rayy. It is said that he was born in his mother’s village in the province of Ṭabaristān in the year 61 AH, and that he was brought to Kūfah while still a small child; others say this happened while he was yet in the womb.
He met Anas ibn Mālik and quoted him, and he reported—by way of tadlīs (concealing the intermediary)—from Anas and from ʿAbd Allāh ibn Abī Awfā, for great authority though he was, the man did practice tadlīs.
He also transmitted ḥadīth from Abū Wāʾil, Zayd ibn Wahb, Abū ʿAmr al-Shaybānī, Ibrāhīm al-Nakhaʿī, Saʿīd ibn Jubayr, Abū Ṣāliḥ al-Sammān, Mujāhid, Abū Ḍubyān, Khaythamah ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, Zir ibn Ḥubaysh, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Abī Laylā, Kumayl ibn Ziyād, al-Maʿrūr ibn Suwayd, al-Walīd ibn ʿUbādah ibn al-Ṣāmit, Tamīm ibn Salamah, Sālim ibn Abī al-Jaʿd, ʿAbd Allāh ibn Murrah al-Hamdānī, ʿUmārah ibn ʿUmayr al-Laythī, Qays ibn Abī Ḥāzim, Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Yazīd al-Nakhaʿī, Hilāl ibn Yasāf, Abū Ḥāzim al-Ashjaʿī Sulaymān, Abū l-ʿĀliyah al-Riyāḥī, Ismāʿīl ibn Rijāʾ, Thābit ibn ʿUbayd, Abū Bishr, Ḥabīb ibn Abī Thābit, al-Ḥakam, Dharr ibn ʿAbd Allāh, Ziyād ibn al-Ḥuṣayn, Saʿīd ibn ʿUbaydah, al-Shaʿbī, al-Minhāl ibn ʿAmr, Abū Sabrah al-Nakhaʿī, Abū l-Safr al-Hamdānī, ʿAmr ibn Murrah, Yaḥyā ibn Waththāb, and many others among the senior Successors.
Those who narrated from him include al-Ḥakam ibn ʿUtaybah, Abū Isḥāq al-Sabīʿī, Ṭalḥah ibn Muṣarrif, Ḥabīb ibn Abī Thābit, ʿĀṣim ibn Abī l-Najūd, Ayyūb al-Sakhtiyānī, Zayd ibn Aslam, Ṣafwān ibn Sulaym, Suhayl ibn Abī Ṣāliḥ, Abān ibn Taghlib, Khālid al-Ḥadhdhāʾ, Sulaymān al-Taymī, and Ismāʿīl ibn Abī Khālid—all of them his contemporaries—as well as Abū Ḥanīfah, al-Awzāʿī, Saʿīd ibn Abī ʿArūbah, Ibn Isḥāq, Shuʿbah, Maʿmar, Sufyān, Shaybān, Jarīr ibn Ḥāzim, Zāʾidah, and Jarīr ibn ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd.